To “fight migration”, Rome wants the IMF to consolidate aid to Tunisia

First modification: 04/14/2023 – 00:37

“Our proposal is to start financing Tunisia, through the IMF, and pay, after a first tranche, a second tranche with the progress of the reforms (which the Tunisian IMF expects),” he explained Thursday at a press conference. in Rome, the Italian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Antonio Tajani. A statement that came after a meeting with his Tunisian counterpart, Nabil Ammar.

But these tranches should not be “totally conditional on the conclusion of the reform process,” Tajani stressed. “The (Tunisian) minister has assured me that the reforms continue,” he said.

Tunisia, indebted around 80% of its GDP, obtained an agreement in principle in mid-October, subject to certain conditions, for a new loan of almost 2,000 million dollars with the IMF. One with which the country sought to overcome the serious financial crisis it is going through.

But according to the financial institution, Negotiations have stalled due to the lack of a firm commitment from Tunisia to implement a reform program to restructure the more than 100 state-owned companiesheavily indebted, and abolish subsidies on some basic products.

Last week, the Tunisian president, Kaïs Saied, rejected the “dictations” of the IMF, which make a loan to Tunisia conditional on carrying out these structural reforms.

“As for the IMF, foreign dictates are unacceptable, which only lead to further impoverishment,” said Saied on April 6, jeopardizing negotiations with the financial organization.

European leaders, including Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, fear that an economic collapse in Tunisia will increase migration flows to European shores. Meloni’s far-right government was elected on the promise of a hard line against migration and is concerned about the increase in crossings of the Mediterranean, especially from Tunisia.

“All the skeptical or non-positive messages about Tunisia (…) do not help the Tunisian economy and therefore feed all the scourges, including illegal migration,” Tajani said on Thursday. And he added: “Helping the Tunisian economy also means fighting migration.”

Italy, once again the first gateway to Europe through the Mediterranean

Since the beginning of the year, the increase in departures from the Tunisian coasts is particularly alarming. The crossings have grown by 900%, in a context of economic crisis and strong discrimination against sub-Saharan migrants in the country. Of those who have arrived so far in 2023, more than 5,000 are Ivorians and more than 4,000 Guineans, according to figures recorded by AFP.

Italy is the country that has received the most migrants since the beginning of 2023. Despite her firm promises, the head of government has to deal with the fact that since 2021 Italy has once again become the main gateway Europe through the Mediterranean, ahead of Greece and Spain. More than 31,000 people have already crossed the central Mediterranean and reached its shores, not only from Tunisia, but also from Libya and Turkey.

This situation is causing fatal events. On the night of February 25-26, a boat from Turkey that had been reported to the Italian coast guard sank on the beaches of Crotone, killing 93 people.

Since January of this year, almost 500 people have died at sea in their attempt to reach Europe, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM). The flows – which have been 300% higher than in the same period in 2022 – could exceed the record numbers of 2016, when 180,000 people arrived at Italian ports.

“The continuing humanitarian crisis in the central Mediterranean is intolerable,” IOM Director General Antonio Vitorino said Wednesday April 12. “With more than 20,000 deaths recorded on this route since 2014, I fear these deaths have normalized.”

At the same time, he recalled that “saving lives at sea is a legal obligation of States”, and denounced the “criminalization” of NGO boats and the violence against them by the Libyan coast guard. Since the end of the military and humanitarian naval operation “Mare Nostrum” in 2014, there has been no coordinated rescue action in the Mediterranean.

In response to this influx, the Italian Council of Ministers announced on Tuesday the imposition of a state of immigration emergency throughout the country for six months. A measure that is part of the civil protection code. This makes it possible to release funds and speed up reception procedures by designating accommodation centers dependent on the Ministry of the Interior. It should also make it possible to more quickly charter ferries or planes to transfer people who landed on the small island of Lampedusa, to which more than two-thirds of arrivals converge, to the rest of Italy.

Lastly, the strategy must also attract the attention of the European Union, from which Rome particularly expects the implementation of new solidarity mechanisms to receive migrants.

AFP and local media